


Sense Motive

by cyrene



Series: How to Lose Friends and Alienate People [6]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Background Relationships, Dad stuff, Gen, Hakoda (Avatar) is a Good Parent, Minor Sokka/Suki, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, minor reference to child abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-10
Updated: 2018-03-10
Packaged: 2019-03-29 08:39:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13923456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyrene/pseuds/cyrene
Summary: Takes place immediately after "Bluff Check".Featuring Hakoda, who is just making this parenting thing up as he goes along, damnit.





	Sense Motive

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, I'm really on a roll.

 

"MY DARLING CHILDREN," Hakoda calls out, "I HAVE RETURNED TO YOU VICTORIOUS!"

It is their traditional greeting. Usually, typically, it's followed by the sight of his offspring. Sure, they didn't run in like they had when they were younger, but he is still accustomed to a "Hi, Dad!" every time he came home from a business trip.

That is... not what he encounters.

Katara leaps out of her chair and runs to greet him. Sure. But, in doing so, she leaves behind a boy -- and why is his shirt ripped?

Sokka, always the less mysterious of his two offspring, came stumbling out of his room, shirt inside out, saying, "Hey-dad-Suki-and-I-were-just-watching-a-movie!" breathlessly.

Hakoda puts his head in his hand.

"Suki, go home," he says, not unkindly, just a little wearily. "Sokka will see you... well, maybe not tomorrow, but some time soon."

Suki nods once, exiting with flaming cheeks and quick steps.

"As for you, Lee," he assumes this must be the much-talked-about Lee from their game, but he's never met him before. That moment, that thought, is when Hakoda looks up and sees Lee for the first time.

"Lee" his ass.

"You, come outside and help me unpack the car," he says, trying to keep his voice level. He waits for the boy to precede him, gesturing grandly at the doorway.

"Dad," Katara says, horrified, the moment he is out the front door, "you are not going to make assumptions about what happened here tonight and then do this totally misogynist --"

"That's enough, Katara," Hakoda snaps, and walks away, outside.

The boy is leaned up against his car, waiting and wary. He looks up from the ground as Hakoda settles himself in a wide stance directly in front of him.

"Zuko Sozin," he says softly, "what are you doing in my living room?"

The boy startles, his eyes wide and frightened. "How do you know that name?" he demands, and Hakoda shows him his badge. "Ah. Intelligence. Of course. Fucking figures."

"I know. You pretty much disappeared five years ago. What happened? Start with your face."

"Up yours, pig!" Zuko spits, pushing himself up off the car so he is standing taller than the man before him.

"Hey," Hakoda hisses, pointing a finger in the boy's face, the idea of backing down from this kid a joke, "may I remind you that I found you in my house, with my daughter. I think I have the right to ask you a few questions. Does she know who you are?"

The boy sighs, leaning back against the car again, rubbing his face with both hands. "No. None of them do. How am I supposed to tell them a thing like that? I can picture it -- 'Hey, guys, Zuko here! Yeah, son of the evil Ozai Sozin, whose giant criminal organization has fucked up each of your lives in some way. Mind if I still join your group and play a fire bender?"

Hakoda snorts a laugh. "No, I guess not. What are you doing here? We lost track of you around the time --"

"Around the time I got this?" he asks, gesturing to his ruined face, and Hakoda feels terribly sorry for him in that moment.

Hakoda has scars, sure, but to be disfigured and young, with all the feelings of a young person, must be such a burden like he couldn't even imagine.

"Nothing happened," Zuko assures him. "I got mugged, and I didn't want to go to the hospital, and Katara said she could take care of it for me. That's all you walked in on."

"Katara did those stitches?" Hakoda asked, surprised. His mind was a system of pixels rapidly organizing themselves into a big picture. "Look, you obviously care about my daughter as more than just a friend," he begins.

"Whoa, hey, I am not doing anything with Katara!"

"Obviously not," Hakoda says with hard eyes, "especially not as long as you're being dishonest with her about who you are, right?" He stressed this last word just so.

"Uh, right. Gotcha... sir."

Hakoda nods, and hopes he looks like the wise and understanding father he is trying to portray, but what these kids don't know is that he is -- all adults are -- making this up as he goes. "Good. All right then. I'm sure my children will be seeing you soon for their game thing. Oh, and Sokka can't drive your motorcycle. Not ever."

Zuko gives him the quintessential teenage "Duh" face and says, "Will you tell them I said bye?" in a way that doesn't quite cover his insecurities.

Hakoda's heart really goes out to this boy. He's been on the Sozin case for six years now, and for five they've all been wondering what happened to little Zuko. Where he was, if he was safe, if he had gone into hiding like his mother -- not with her, she had no idea where he was. He had been to see her, to make sure, and she had reiterated what she'd said every time before: she would not testify while the monster had her children.

Literally everyone had lost the pool at work, because no one in their right mind, when asked, "Where's the Fire Lord's son?" would have guessed, "In 'Koda's living room, playing PoTE with his kids."

This was an opportunity, though. If he could gain the boy's trust, maybe reunite him with his mother, they might get both of them on the stand and that might be enough to put Ozai Sozin away for life.

"What happened?" Hakoda asked again.

"I... lost my honor," the boy said quietly.

"Oh," Hakoda said with pity. "Zuko. I don't know what he wanted you do that you wouldn't or couldn't, but I'm pretty sure not doing it is what kept you your honor, not lost it."

He says this, knowing that the boy will not internalize it, that he would not have listened to The Man at that age either.

"Go on home, wherever that is," Hakoda says finally. "Think about telling your friends the truth."

He watches the boy drive away on his motorcycle and wishes, as many parent has wished before, that there were a way he could keep his children safely off the back of that vehicle. He suspects, however, that Sokka and Katara are too old for a father's protection now, and anything he says would only drive them further in the direction they want to go. The best he can do is make sure he's close enough to the kids to catch them when they fall.

Like Sokka and the chicken incident. Or Sokka and the shopping carts incident. Or anything Sokka did after his first girlfriend, a sweet girl called Yue, had died of leukemia. Katara, on the other hand, has never needed much of a safety net. At this point, Hakoda figures she'll either never fall, or come crashing down harder than life can handle.

He looks at the house, where both of his children are staring out the window with no subtlety whatsoever, and shakes his head. He'd better go back inside and put them out of their misery. How long can he afford to ground them before they all three go insane?

 

 


End file.
